Page 171 of Code Bound
He’s leaning back against the wall, his expression sour, as he stares off into the city. “Are you done talking about me?” he asks, before leveling me with his gaze.
I keep my face a mask. I don’t show him my relief, or my eagerness. In fact, I reach up and pull my hyena mask down over my face to hide my expression entirely. I don’t want him to see any sort of pleasure about him joining us, especially when he’d made us wait for no reason other than his ego.
Locke, on the other hand, just laughs. “At this rate, we’re gonna have to start a guild,” he jokes.
I glance at him. “A . . . what?”
“Guild,” he repeats. When I don’t look suddenly knowledgeable about what he’s talking about, he frowns. “You didn’t read the information at the beginning? It was in the fine print.”
“You didn’t read anything about your Glitch, but you read the fine print?” I ask, flabbergasted.
“Read is a loose term,” he says, shrugging. “Cipher didn’t talk to me like he did you, so I was left with paragraphs of information. My eyes caught on the word ‘guild’ and I read maybe two sentences. All I know is it’s a group of people really.”
Ah. Yeah, he didn’t read it at all. Still, neither had I. Cipher had been there to give me the information I needed, so I hadn’t bothered to read that initial information. With my panic over Dox and my amazement of the new world I’d found myself in, I hadn’t even remembered that it was even there. Which is foolish. I should go back and read up on everything I might have missed.
“Guilds are very rare,” Cipher announces to all of us. “One has not been formed in a hundred years.”
I frown. “And why is that?”
“A guild is a group of people who form a close connection or had a close connection while inside the Harrow. A guild makes the players more powerful together, as there are some shared stats and perks that can be beneficial. However,” he says, pausing for effect. “A guild can also make you more vulnerable. Once formed and joined, guild members can see your stats at will. It is very easy to exploit what you know.”
Havoc studies me and then his eyes trail over to Locke. “I would not form a guild with a Bone Breaker.”
Locke’s expression drops. The laughter dies. “And why is that?”
Havoc shrugs. “Bone Breakers are dangerous. It’s never a good idea to be vulnerable around one.”
Locke pops his knuckles and rolls his shoulders, the gentle pop, pop, pop of the bones snapping echoing in my ears despite being on the loud street. “You talk a lot of shit about my Glitch,” he says to Havoc. Havoc, to his credit, doesn’t respond immediately, but his eyes find mine and hold. Like a warning.
The same warning that Cipher has repeated to me over and over again. Havoc meets my eyes like he knows that Cipher’s been warning me, like he knows that I’ve been told and have ignored those warnings.
“You’ll see why,” Havoc says, still looking at me, talking to me more than explaining to Locke, “soon enough.”
CHAPTER47
HAVOC
ENTERING NEW ZONE: Welcome to the Gilded District
I barely react to the notification as it pops up on my interface and then disappears. I’ve already been through this zone hundreds of times, but it’s clear the other two get a notification that unlocks their map. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, following these low levels around like a fucking dog, but here I am.
Because she’d asked me to.
Cipher laughs in my mind. “I did warn you.”
“Shut up,” I grumble under my breath.
I can’t even place what it is on anything in particular. She’s a beautiful woman, sure, but beautiful women pass through the Harrow all the time, sometimes stopping and attempting to seduce me. It’s common at this point, and I don’t blame the women. Hell, I don’t blame the men that try it either. Anything to get a leg up here makes sense, and having someone with a reputation on your side means that Luxe will be watching. And if Luxe is watching, perhaps you can be a favorite and get some loot. In my almost decade of being in the Harrow, I have never taken anyone up on the offer.
Until now.
I glance at Vesper as she moves, her movements as fluid as any Beast Bound. She’s a Tier One, and practically useless with her powers at this point, but her Glitch has still modified her. I wonder if she even understands that. I wonder if she knows she moves like a feline, if she knows her eyes shine in the dark.
“Looks like there’s a Minor Boss just up ahead,” the Bone Breaker comments, clearly the navigator between them.
That surprises me. Most Bone Breakers are actual boneheads. They ain’t got a lot going for them in the intelligence department. Locke seems to follow most Bone Breaker logic, meaning he uses his fists before his brain, but . . . he’s still capable of following a map. Interesting.
“You wanna head that way?” Vesper asks.
